(ESPNCRICINFO) – Keep your eyes on Shubman Gill. The captain. With Mumbai Indians on 107 for 2 after 12 overs, chasing 169, he barracked his team to get back in the game. And boy, did they ever.

A batting line-up that is the envy of the T20 world came undone even with conditions pretty much in their favour, with two set batters at the crease and dew all over the park. And Titans, who had less than 8% chance of victory, went on to achieve a famous one. Or maybe it isn’t. Because they keep doing this. They keep defying the odds.

Here they had their former captain — the one who built them into IPL winners — give them a huge scare. Hardik Pandya went 6 and 4 to start the last over when 19 were required. He looked in the mood. His old coach Ashish Nehra, who spent a vast majority of the chase patrolling the boundary, issuing instructions – seemingly spoon-feeding Spencer Johnson what he had to do in a 19th over that produced two of the five wickets that fell in the last 13 balls – turned away. He couldn’t watch.
But he should have.

Because Umesh Yadav, who doesn’t really bowl at the death, took full advantage of the two-bouncers-an-over rule and sent one up at Hardik’s right ear, which, even with his power, only went as far as the fielder at long-on. Eighty thousand and eighty one people roared in unison. They sensed it. They sensed that yet another incredible win was theirs.

Pace off, game on
This game turned between overs 13 and 17 in the chase. Because only one of them yielded more than a-run-a-ball.
R Sai Kishore, who doesn’t always make the Titans XI but has never come across like he’s been on the outside looking in, produced a very mature performance. He took out Rohit Sharma with some style, slowing his pace right down, pulling his length right back, and having an excellent player of spin so badly reaching for the ball that he fell over in his crease as he played the sweep.

Rashid Khan took over from there on and created a moment that signalled the shifting of the balance. Mumbai’s best power-hitter, Tim David, was hidden from the strike because he has been averaging 7.6 against legspin since IPL 2022. This was the 17th over and the required rate was still in the eight-and-a-bit range. The batting side had six wickets in hand. They really shouldn’t have been under pressure with an equation like that.

But they were and the wickets as a result of that pressure went to Mohit Sharma, who is a wonderful case study because his biggest strength goes against his job description. The fast bowler who is far more dangerous when he bowls his slower ball. That came in very handy on a two-paced pitch. He dismissed David with an offcutter-boucner that rose up to the batter’s helmet and took away all his power.
A Titans comeback, which only ever looked fanciful till then, became reality.